WAITING FOR GODOT. To 8 March.
Manchester.
WAITING FOR GODOT
by Samuel Beckett.
Library Theatre To 8 March 2008.
Mon-Thu 7.30pm Fri-Sat 8pm Mat Sat 3pm, 14, 21 Feb 2.30pm, 27 Feb, 5 March 2pm.
Audio-described 19 Feb, 1 March 3pm.
BSL Signed 6 March.
Captioned 28 Feb.
Pre-show talk 13 Feb, 20 Feb 6.30pm, 21 Feb 1.30pm.
Runs 2hr 35min One interval.
TICKETS: 0161 236 7110.
www.librarytheatre.com
Review: Timothy Ramsden
'ee bah gum, nothing’s happening twice again.
Several years ago Richard Gregory directed Harold Pinter’s The Dumb Waiter in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, with characters speaking in Tyneside accents. Suddenly, decades of comment on Pinter’s “pauses” and “menace” could be seen as problems arising from actors and audiences assuming the dialogue should be regarded as middle-class and rationally ordered. It now seemed as rich in comedy and texture, but sounding natural as could be.
Chris Honer’s Manchester Godot, as far from Beckett’s inner ear as Tyneside is from Pinter’s native Hackney, isn’t quite so revelatory. Minor accommodations are needed. “Get up while I embrace you,” Vladimir tells Estragon (replacing the Irish “till I embrace you”). And David Fielder’s richly-detailed facial expressions, and slight vocalised embellishments, in particular, are some distance from Beckett’s stripped-down production style.
Yet seeing these tramps as a northern comedy double-act is no gimmick. A comic double-act often contains the mix of solidity and fancy, the hope and gloom of Beckett’s pairing. George Costigan’s Estragon is obsessed with his feet, being frequently still, seated or looking down. Repeatedly he falls asleep standing.
Vladimir’s bladder-problem has him running around. He’s the one with hopes, who looks outwards. So when the near-end has him still, feeling passive and observed, his dialogue poetically mixing burial and birth, the bleakness is the more intense.
Comic acts make fun from the frustrations and rebuffs of life, as Godot playfully, then poetically, defines human futility. Yet the play questions this futility in it own impact, as the popular comedy acts bring light to the lives they describe.
And the northern rhythms also recall soap-operas, those parades of nothingness with only surface appearance of purpose. Without that surface, the play’s dialogue – never more than at the start of Act Two – seems to throw the non-progression of soaps back in our faces.
Add Russell Dixon’s Pozzo, standing proud, irate with a self-importance it becomes increasingly clear is built on insecurity about a world without its social superstructures, David Neilson’s tough-looking Lucky, who hands back the whip to blind Pozzo, continuing his servitude, and a touching use of Godot’s boy-messenger and this imaginative, coherent production is revelatory.
Vladimir: David Fielder.
Estragon: George Costigan.
Pozzo: Russell Dixon.
Lucky: David Neilson.
Boy: Daniel Shaw/Lewis Potts.
Director: Chris Honer.
Designer: Judith Croft.
Lighting: Nick Richings.
Sound: Paul Gregory.
Fight director: Renny Krupinski.
2008-02-07 17:31:52